Extreme secrecy surrounds Comey book manuscript

Former FBI Director James Comey‘s book is set to land just as the frenzy surrounding Michael Wolff’s tell-all ”Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House” has settled down. | Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

“A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies and Leadership,” the upcoming memoir from former FBI Director James Comey, is set for publication on April 18 — and with anticipation rivaling that of the cult children’s favorite, the publisher is taking extreme precautions to prevent potentially explosive revelations detailing Comey’s interactions with President Donald Trump from leaking.

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Instead of circulating multiple print drafts among the editors and agents working on the book, the publisher, Flatiron Books, has implemented a password-protected electronic system so that only those involved in the project have access to it.

The project is stored under a code name so that staffers who are not involved in the project wouldn’t know where to find it if they tried. At warehouses that will ship out copies of the book, workers are being asked to sign nondisclosure agreements, according to people familiar with the procedures.

And while books typically ship out from warehouses about two weeks before their official publication dates — sometimes landing on bookstore shelves days early — the shipping date for Comey’s book is expected to be moved closer to the publication date to keep a tighter lid on the physical copies.

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The Comey book is set to land just as the frenzy surrounding Michael Wolff’s tell-all ”Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House” has settled down. Like Wolff’s book, Comey’s is expected to provide an inside-the-room account of how Trump’s White House functions — but without the overarching questions about the author’s credibility casting a shadow over its contents.

Aside from his public testimony before Congress, Comey has been disciplined in remaining virtually silent about his past interactions with the president, or the developments in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation — even though it was the circumstances of his termination that are at the core of questions about whether the president tried to obstruct justice.

Last month, Comey tweeted a book teaser: a picture of himself in a recording studio, where he has been working on his audiobook: “Lordy, this time there will be a tape. Audio book almost finished,” he wrote online, a reference to his reaction, during his appearance before the Senate Intelligence Committee last June, to Trump’s suggestion that he had tapes of their conversations.

But mostly, Comey’s feed has featured enigmatic pictures of the back of his head in various locations: in front of the Statue of Liberty; in a cornfield in Iowa; and sitting in front of the Comey family Christmas tree.

The quiet before the storm is helping to build anticipation: The book is already Amazon’s No. 1 bestseller in three categories: politics & social sciences, law, and biography.

The book is expected to provide the former FBI director’s first full accounting since he was fired of his experience working under Trump, as well as an account of his time serving in the previous two administrations.

It's not uncommon for books from high-profile public figures, like former presidents, to come with requests for bookstores to sign NDAs. But Comey's book is landing at a particularly explosive moment for Trump — making its rollout all the more carefully controlled. That also means it could potentially turn an enraged president into the book’s most effective publicist. Lawyers working in the White House once promised the president that Mueller would have his investigation wrapped up by the holidays, before moving the goal line to the beginning of 2018.

But over the past few months, the investigation has appeared only to intensify, with new indictments, as well as former campaign operatives like Rick Gates pleading guilty and cooperating with the special counsel’s office. Trump, meanwhile, has grown increasingly fixated on the FBI, the Justice Department and Mueller’s progress, often polling friends and advisers about their views on the ongoing investigation.

Comey’s book on its own is unlikely to have any impact on Mueller’s findings, as the former FBI chief has already been interviewed by the special counsel. “But any revelations, combined with a high-profile media tour, where he talks about troubling interactions with the president, is without a doubt going to have an impact with the public,” said Matthew Miller, who served as a spokesman for the Justice Department under President Barack Obama. “And then there’s the X factor of whether Trump gets so angry that he does something rash, or takes some action, in response.”

The White House has done nothing, so far, to prepare a crisis communications plan to contend with the book, as it deals with almost daily high-profile departures from the administration, officials said. “A few weeks away is a lifetime for us,” said one administration official when asked whether there are any media plans in the works to counter Comey’s book.

White House lawyer Ty Cobb wrote in an email that the government was expecting to get a copy for review, but that he has not been involved. Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders did not respond to a request for comment about any rapid response plans in the works.

But by mid-April, the Comey book could be on the front burner for the White House communications team dealing with blowback, and driving the questions at Sanders’ daily briefing.

The book promises “never-before-told experiences from some of the highest-stakes situations of his career.” That is expected to include new details about Comey’s now infamous “loyalty” dinner with Trump at the White House, as well as a first-ever chronicling of how Comey briefed Trump about the Christopher Steele dossier at Trump Tower during the transition.

The book could land at a complicated moment for Comey, as well. “A Higher Loyalty” was originally scheduled for release on May 1, but the publisher last month announced it was moving up the publishing date because of the “intense scrutiny” surrounding the FBI.

Comey detractors, however, have speculated that the change had more to do with spinning another major piece of Comey’s legacy: his handling of the investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s email during the 2016 election, which he is also expected to detail in the memoir.

The FBI inspector general’s report reviewing allegations of misconduct by Comey in connection with the email probe is also expected to come out this spring. “It’s hard to believe it won’t be critical of how he handled things,” said Miller. “There is speculation that he moved up the publication date to get ahead of the report. In the book he will come off as the saint he thinks he is.”

In terms of promotion plans, Comey so far is scheduled to sit down for an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos. He’ll also appear on “The Late Show” with Stephen Colbert and has been booked as a guest on “The View” on the day the book comes out.

A full book tour has yet to be announced, but local stores are already planning their events. "I expect it to be big," said Lissa Muscatine, the owner of Politics & Prose bookstore in Washington and a longtime Clinton speechwriter. " He's a celebrity, he's controversial, and he's been in the news. We're doing a ticketed event with him at a venue that is bigger than the store."

A spokeswoman for Flatiron Books, Marlena Bittner, did not respond to a request for comment. Comey’s agent, Keith Urbahn, declined to comment about the book.

Comey’s friends expect the revelations in the book to do most of the selling themselves.

“I’m disinclined to talk about this subject,” Benjamin Wittes, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and friend of Comey’s who in the past has shared details about their conversations, wrote in an email when asked about the book. “I spoke about my conversations with Jim because I had information that needed to be made public and because nobody else was in a position to speak publicly about such matters. By contrast, this book will speak for itself.”